BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

At least this much is clear...

The three-year A-licenses are currently under review, but you gotta figure Caja Laboral Baskonia, FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Olympiacos, Panathinaikos, Anadolu Efes, Fenerbahçe Ülker, CSKA Moscow, Maccabi Tel Aviv, Montepaschi Siena and Žalgiris Kaunas are in. Asseco Prokom Gdynia is in the second year of its license, making them the 12th of the 24 teams.

Also up for review is Unicaja Malaga. While Spain is still even officially considered *the* best domestic or regional league in Europe (more on this momentarily), the big league could certainly defend a yanking of the license based on the team’s bottom-half finish in the Liga Endesa and consistently better recent performance by Valencia BC.

Virtus Roma is the only original A-license team to have been removed from the EL roll call, getting its placement in Euroleague ball “suspended for having finished in the bottom half of its national competition.” Unicaja might easily find itself on the Eurocup level for 2012-13; let’s just say a *lot* of things would have to happen to even get the team into the EL qualifiers.

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With the recent announcement that the 2011-12 champions won’t in fact be seeking a second go-around in the Adriatic League and hard economic realities facing many Serbian and Croatian clubs, BallinEurope contributor Marko Savkovic today asks the hard question about one of Europe’s most prestigious associations.

Something is always up in the Adriatic League. After Maccabi Tel Aviv informed the league about its decision not to participate in next year’s competition, sportswriters started looking for a replacement but one announcement caught everyone’s attention: ULEB, it seems, has considered cutting number of teams entering the competition directly to just two. Therefore, whoever finishes third will go to qualifications. If agreed upon, this decision will become effective beginning in the 2013-14 season.

This is yet another blow to a proud basketball nation, since Belgrade powerhouse Partizan has failed – once again – in its efforts to receive a Euroleague’s “A” license.

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As befits tradition, the 2012 Nike International Junior Tournament is running in parallel with the Euroleague Final Four competition in Istanbul. Eight youth league teams are competing for the grand prize – and, individually speaking, to garner some attention from club scouts as each player’s career burgeons on the big stage.

In the bigger picture, the NIJT games (and introductory qualifying tournaments) also serve as a handy barometer of club play on the national level. After day one, then, it’s good news for Croatia and Lithuania, whose homegrown squads swept, and bad news for Turkey, as powerhouses Fenerbahçe Ülker and Anadolu Efes both lost. And what’s up with FC Barcelona…?

KK Zagreb 79, Fenerbahçe Ülker 76
As though The Next Big Thing Out Of Croatia, a.k.a. 2011 NIJT MVP Dario Saric, weren’t enough, NIJT competitors will also apparently now have to take notice of Dominik Mavra as well. While Saric put in a ridiculous man-among-boys performance of 26 points, 17 rebounds, six assists and five steals, Mavra “added” 30 points and six boards as the pair consistently foiled any attempt by Fenerbahçe to establish their tempo: Each went to the free-throw line 12 times in the game and accounted for over 70% of the Croatian side’s points.

Crvena Zvezda 86, FC Barcelona Regal 77
The much-touted Blaugrana suffered a disappointing performance against Crvena Zvezda to take a nine-point loss after going up 18-12 in the first quarter and 20-15 after 10 minutes of play. Worse for Spanish basketball, Barcelona’s main contributors were foreigners Ludde “El Matador Sueco” Hakanson, Nick Spires and Alexandr Zhigulin. Crvena Zvezda’s big men pretty much had their way with Barça’s – even Spires’ 13 points belies his frustrating 4-of-15 overall shooting – as Serbia’s Dusan Ristic put in a crushing 23-point, 12-rebound (including six offensive) show.

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For just the fourth time in 15 years, Team USA lost the marquee match at the Nike Hoop Summit to the World Select squad. Dario Saric, a.k.a. The Next Big Thing coming out of Croatia, put in a double-double of 13 points and 14 rebounds in the World’s 84-75 win, with the latter mark tying the record currently also held by Dirk Nowitzki, Milan Macvan and Nemanja Aleksandrov.

In a post-game interview with the NBA Draft Insider, Saric agrees that he might best serve as a “point forward” – after all, the smooth ball-handling Croatian enjoys the playmaker position best but he’s just a bit too tall. On the other hand, Saric lists his role model as Magic Johnson…

Also of Euro-centric note: Enes Kanter’s record-setting mark of 2008 was topped by the USA’s power forward Shabazz Muhammad, who was good for 35 points … Vytenis Cizauskas of Lithuania saw some quality time and grabbed five rebounds.

The entire game – including warmups and post-game press conferences – may be found on the YouTube channel of Net Scouts Basketball; quarter one, part one runs below to get you started. Official FIBA writeup of the game follows the video.

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Here’s a bizarre image from Zagreb, where a mystery person or persons made a slight temporary addition to the statue outside the Drazen Petrovic Memorial Museum. Big deal; BallinEurope bets he still made the shot.

(Tip of the hat to Eurostep for uploading the pic.)

Update: Savas Birdal over at Eurostep reveals that the handiwork was perpetuated by Cibona Zagreb fan or fans, who also left a note at the scene reading ”Kapetane, ne gledaj ovo” (or “Captain, don’t watch this”) in reference to the last season and a half of dismal play from Petrovic’s former club. Cibona Zagreb is 7-6 in Adriatic League play thus far in 2011-12 and did not advance to the Top 16 round of Eurocup play after going 0-6 in the first round.

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Funny … after the 2011 NBA Draft, was BallinEurope completely alone in guessing the New Jersey Nets got a steal of a pick by landing via trade with the Miami Heat the no. 31 overall selection Bojan Bogdanovic? BiE’d like to think not. After all, contributions to Cibona Zagreb last season in the Adriatic League, the Croatian A-1 League and 10 games of Euroleague play were impressive, even if he seemingly had no one to pass to.

So, how do the prospects look for Bogdanovic after a handful of games with Fenerbahçe Ülker in Euroleague and TBL play? BallinEurope’s man in the U.K., Sam Chadwick, assesses the Croat’s performance thus far … and Nets backers are certain to be disappointed.

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For bonus points, identify this player

The quiz is multiple choice and is European- and NBA-centric in topic. It is multiple guess choice, and so choose the one answer that best completes the phrase or answers the question. You may use any writing implement at your disposal to fill in the answers – as long as you don’t mind marking up your screen, that is. Good luck. You may begin the exam now.

1. In the 2010-11 season, Dirk Nowitzki became most known for:
a) Being a clutch player, despite an arguably disappointing past history.
b) Entering the conversation as one of the NBA’s top 20 players of all-time.
c) Passing 22,000 career NBA points.
d) Take Dat Wit Chew.

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Rosters for the 2011 Nike Hoop Summit have been released and while The Continent is well-represented on the World Select Team, BallinEurope considers there to be at least one shocking omission.

Team World will include Davis Bertans (Latvia/Union Olimpija); Evan Fournier (France/Poitiers); Przemyslaw Karnowski (Poland/SMS PZKosz); Mateusz Ponitka (Poland/Tempcold AZS); and Dario Saric (Croatia/KK Zagreb). Other players on the club are Canadians Kyle Wiltjer and Kevin Pangos, plus Brazilians Lucas Nogueira and Raul Neto.

Anybody else identify the missing name…? That’s right: This would seem to be another slap in the face for basketball’s most famous neo-Kentucky Wildcat, Enes Kanter. Kanter had told media last week that he’d be entering the NBA Draft and that he “expect[ed] to play for the International team in the Nike Hoop Summit in Portland, Ore., on April 9, where he would face UK recruits Michael Gilchrist, Anthony Davis and Marquis Teague.”

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The dust – and in Germany, the glass – has settled on a week of Cup tournament action throughout The Continent, so it’s time for BallinEurope to crunch the numbers in compiling the weekly Top 100 Teams in Europe list.

But, ran the first question, what relative weight should be prescribed for these games for national bragging rights? Should there just be a bonus for winning the big enchilada and perhaps ending up Cup runner-up? How much of national tournaments are mostly about pride and how much should a winning team be credited for beating an all-too-familiar-opponent? And how to keep the Copa del Rey winner from clinching the number one spot for the rest of the season?

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Talk about your February Madness. In the Krešimir Ćosić Cup, a.k.a. the Croatian Cup, semifinals last night, unheralded KK Zadar (10-19 overall in 2010-11) stunned Eurocup Top 16 team Cedevita Zagreb (16-13), 83-82, on the favorites’ home court.

What’s that you say? Not so crazy? Upsets happen all the time? Okay, consider that KK Zadar fielded five players *for the entire 40 minutes.* That’s right, no substitutions were made.

Starting to get bizarre? Okay, now factor in that, of those five Zadar players, four were younger than 23 years old.

The icing on the straitjacket? Cedevita head coach Aleksandar Petrovic apparently reacted in the only way he saw fit, i.e. to resign his position in embarrassment, effective immediately.

But please, enjoy a little of the madness for yourself below the break, with Marko Car, Paul Marčinković, Sime Olivari, Mario Dundovic and an unlikely hero in buzzer-beating 19-year-old Ivan Batur. Happy February, Europe!

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